Zatch forced a smile on and said, "At least he's not 'Kira,' right?"

Zatch walked to cl*censored* by memory, quickening his pace. He got a little confused at one intersection, but ended up going the right way. He walked by Katsu, happy to have her company if nothing else. He opened the door the the cl*censored*room, glad that he didn't have to change rooms every hour like he had in America or England. Maybe there was an up-side to living here, but that hope was quickly turned to loathing as the bell rang before he could finnish stepping inside. He swore in German, clenching long and pale hands into fists. Oh, Kou would not be pleased. Zatch shiftred at the thought of being sent back on a plane to Europe, where he'd be alone again.

"I HATE traveling...." Zatch grumbled as he pushed open the door and walked inside. Never had moving around the world effected him so much than now and oh how he loathed, if nothing else, the dramatic time change.

Zatch continued in. He shuffled through his memory. "Er, no, I really don't know him." He eventually said with an akward chuckle. He hoped that he hadn't offended her.

((It feels so weird to not be so literate....))

((lol))

"Don't tell ANYBODY this but my dad is Ki-"she looked up at her friends.

Zatch eyed Katsu, not quite sure what he'd heard as he took his seat. He sat down, wondering if he dared fall asleep. This time change will be the death of me. He turned his attention back to Katsu, narrowing his eyebrows to enphasise he was a little confused. A wan smile continued to dance on his lip, however. He was so glad to have found a sort of friend in the strange place so different from his own. "I'm sorry, I don't think I heard you right."

The teen's stomach flipped, again hoping that he hadn't insulted her. It was his fault for being tired and zoning out. He stiffled a yawn, breifly thinking about whatever Kou was doing, besides likely being lost three towns over. He gave his head a quick shake, remembering where he was again. She looked at Katsu, tring to look as appologetic as he could without straining. It was tiring keeping his mindset in Japanese and not German or English like he was used to.

Zatch twitched, his face fekt hot, his stomach flipped. Katsu's father... was Kira? Was she being serious, delusional, or just tring to pull something over on the forein exchange student? He looked down at his handbook for kanji characters, thinking hard. Did he really have an opinion on the Kira Case? No, he could see both sides of the issue equally, but...

Zatch shifted. Though he didn't care, he knew Kou would die for this information. Kou himself didn't exacly have an opinion, either, but did want to stop Kira. (Zatch was almost certian Kou was desprate for L's attention after he left, since Kou never really had parents.) Finally, Zatch turned back to Katsu. For now, he would keep this to himself and file it away as something to keep in mind. "Well, if nothing else it must be nice knowing he cares enough about you to do that. My parents didn't care enough to stop me from leaving them."

The German boy had been 13 when he went backpacking alone across Europe and run into Zatch in France, who was still breathing in whatever L had to teach him before the three went to England. Zatch's parents never called him or sent out a search that he heard of, and he abandoned his birthright and name for his new found brother's. It wasn't the best of childhoods, but Zatch had meet Kou that way, and he wouldn't change it for the world.

Zatch was a little taken aback by Katsu's sudden embrace, and couldn't help but to give a genuine smile. He almost laughed, in fact, but quickly held his breath. In a Japanese school, you could eaily get detention for laughing too loud. It was kind of ironic, wasn't it? "Okay, but on two conditions." He didn't wait for an answer. "First, you have to promise he won't kill us just because you brout a guy home. Seccond, I'll have to call my brother and let him know I won't be home 'till later, okay?"

Zatch chuckled dispite himself, decided that he wouldn't say anything more about Kou unless he absolutely had to. Just because he would be on the Kira Case ment that he was a target for Kira now, how apparently, was his new best friend's father. And you thought your life was complicated.

"Kou," L swiveled his chair around. "It's been way too long." L looked at him, and then popped another sugar cube into his mouth. "What have you been doing with yourself lately?"he asked. 

((Tri, it should be okay if you don't have one.))

"Cool," Zatch said in a low voice. He liked snakes. Well, he liked alot of things. Snakes in particular was one of the things he and his brother could never agree on. Well, now that he thought about it, any pet of any kind. He knew they traveled too much to keep one, but he constantly entertained the thought.

~~

Kou smiled, pulling up a different chair and sitting in it so he could face L. "Oh, let's see. I took care of Zatch for a year looking for his family, gave up, you left, I enrolled myself in an achademy that sent me to a mental hospital, broke out and started looking for you." He rached over and stoll one of L's suger cubes, poping it into his mouth before he could say anything. "Just got to Japan last week, so I'm not quite familiar with the Kira case yet."

He rolled the sugar cube in his mouth, remembering the hours he would spend as a child plotting and planning on how to take one from L without him even noticing. It had made his head work, molded it to think more like L. In the end, he had stollen only two sugar cubes, but now his count was three.